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Re: How has White Privildge affecred your life

A privilege can be extended or contracted, earned, bought, sold, forfeited, conditioned or arbitrarily withdrawn. Has nothing to do with fairness, by definition.

It's a corruption of language. What justifies it?

You are saying if one group is treated differently under law than another, that's not privilege? How d'ya figure?

In terms of language, privilege is derived from 'private' and 'law,' that is, a law that applies to some persons and not others. If my constitutional rights are respected and those of others are not, that looks pretty close to the definition of privilege. I don't get stopped for driving while white, why should anyone be stopped for driving while any other color?

Re: How has White Privildge affecred your life

Originally Posted by sleek

So, BECAUSE it exist, and BECAUSE im white, my arguments against it are invalid?

You haven't really made an argument against it. You've told us how hard you've worked for what you've got, and good for you. You have not made any argument that there is no such thing as white privilege. You tell us you live in your truck. Have you been stopped for driving while white? If you were constantly being stopped by the police, would it interfere with your work?

Re: How has White Privildge affecred your life

There are plenty of white people who for their place and time are fixed in some lower caste - criminal or whatever. And for many it is inescapeable. Here's the bit: For a black guy similarly fixed, no matter the social skills he cannot move away from his skin. For a white guy, he can. Look at, for example, the many years Whity Bulger lived free of Boston. That's white privilege.

Re: How has White Privildge affecred your life

Originally Posted by sleek

Not to discredit those 3 in the least, or id discredit myself, but.... why does the personal story of 3 in Australia make a valid argument FOR white privilege, but my personal story doesnt count AGAINST it? Is it because Im white?

Why does the personal story of many people who live in or visit Australia make a valid argument FOR the existence of egg-laying duck-billed mammals, but my personal story that I have never seen an egg-laying duck-billed mammal doesn't count AGAINST it?

Is it because I'm not Australian?

Tom

You don't have to be prepared as long as you're willing to suffer the consequences.

Re: How has White Privildge affecred your life

Originally Posted by sleek

So, BECAUSE it exist, and BECAUSE im white, my arguments against it are invalid?

You misunderstand. Let's say we're trying to decide if grizzly bears live in Minnesota. We accumulate a bunch of eyewitness sightings, some photographs, DNA samples from bear droppings and hair, and finally a dead one killed by a truck. From this evidence, we conclude that grizzly bears do indeed live in Minnesota. (They don't, but for the sake of argument . . . ) Now I can truthfully say, 'Well, I've never seen a grizzly bear in Minnesota in all my life.' While that's undoubtedly true, it isn't really relevant.

I don't think anyone claims that every white person alive benefits from 'white privilege', merely that many do. You obviously don't think you have, and you may very well be right. That doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

Originally Posted by WX

White privilege does not mean you have it easy because you are white. It means your skin colour was not a factor that made it harder.

I'd agree with this. Well put.

Originally Posted by bobbys

My wife, goil friend at the time went to Northwestern, her black roommate left her room saying she could not live with a jew and white people. Her black boyfriend yelled at me about white privilege. I said , 'Hey,wait a minute, are you not going to Northwestern while I'm putting roofs on?'

Thing is, 'white privilege' doesn't mean black folks (or folks of any race, color, creed, nation, or ethnicity) are on average any more virtuous than white folks. They aren't. Some of them are total *ssholes. That's how people are.

Last edited by Keith Wilson; 06-13-2018 at 09:36 PM.

"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations,
for nature cannot be fooled."

Re: How has White Privildge affecred your life

Originally Posted by johnw

You are saying if one group is treated differently under law than another, that's not privilege? How d'ya figure?

In terms of language, privilege is derived from 'private' and 'law,' that is, a law that applies to some persons and not others. If my constitutional rights are respected and those of others are not, that looks pretty close to the definition of privilege. I don't get stopped for driving while white, why should anyone be stopped for driving while any other color?

They shouldn't, but it doesn't mean I'm privileged. It means they're discriminated against, and not by law; against the law, in fact.

Re: How has White Privildge affecred your life

Originally Posted by sleek

So, this is a situation where, absence of evidence is evidence of... wait no, its one of, who are you gonna believe, me or your own two lyin.. wait, thats not right either, its, because you cant see it, thats is irrefutable proof that its there?

White privilege is the relative absence of impediment.

There is plenty of proof of White privilege, and it is plain to see.
There is no end of statistics showing how white men fair better in society than anyone else.
Think Maslow's pyramid; the hierarchy of needs. White men have the least impediment to reaching the top than anyone else. They certainly have to work at it, but there are far fewer hurdles.

Understanding that in a democracy elected officials are a reflection of society; the impediment to election success will be felt proportionately by everyone.
As a thought experiment,; number the members of Congress or the Senate by colour and gender, and the pattern of white privilege will become very apparent.

I have no idea what the result is, but i would guess the greatest representation will be of White MEN, then possibly white women, African American Men, Latino Men, African American Women....... people of asian heritage?
I would guess you could do the same with CEO's, School Principals, Senior Police officers and so on. I would bet the same bell curve would fit exactly onto all examples of positions with power and influence.

"People should be able to access these benefits [Social Welfare] as a matter of right, with no more loss of their own standards of self-respect than would be involved in collecting from an insurance company the proceeds of an endowment policy on which they have been paying premiums for years."
Robert Menzies - Liberal Party (Conservative) Prime Minister of Australia.

I didn't die at birth which is better than a lot of black people in Australia. And from there on it just got better and better. House. Food. Medical care. Education. Jobs. I'm lucky. I'm white. There's an unnecessary full stop there if you look closely.

"People should be able to access these benefits [Social Welfare] as a matter of right, with no more loss of their own standards of self-respect than would be involved in collecting from an insurance company the proceeds of an endowment policy on which they have been paying premiums for years."
Robert Menzies - Liberal Party (Conservative) Prime Minister of Australia.

Re: How has White Privildge affecred your life

Originally Posted by Osborne Russell

They shouldn't, but it doesn't mean I'm privileged. It means they're discriminated against, and not by law; against the law, in fact.

You are telling me that what law enforcement does 'is not the law?' It is certainly how the law is presented to those who deal with representatives of the law. You and I have the law enforced on us differently than some other people, and as stated earlier, that is linguistically correctly called privilege.

Re: How has White Privildge affecred your life

Originally Posted by Keith Wilson

You misunderstand. Let's say we're trying to decide if grizzly bears live in Minnesota. We accumulate a bunch of eyewitness sightings, some photographs, DNA samples from bear droppings and hair, and finally a dead one killed by a truck. From this evidence, we conclude that grizzly bears do indeed live in Minnesota. (They don't, but for the sake of argument . . . ) Now I can truthfully say, 'Well, I've never seen a grizzly bear in Minnesota in all my life.' While that's undoubtedly true, it isn't really relevant.

I don't think anyone claims that every white person alive benefits from 'white privilege', merely that many do. You obviously don't think you have, and you may very well be right. That doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

I'd agree with this. Well put.

Ok, so saying white privildge is just a backa$swards way of saying racism. If thats the case then yes, racism exist. But my problem with it is racism exist in all races. Saying just, white pivilidge, lays all racism squarely on whites, and cast the evil shadow of hate on all white look looking people, guilty or not. This breeds hate for all white looking people and it isn't even a slippery slope, its an unstable cliff. You mess with that and you get VERY bad results. It becomes a two headed snake who hates his neighbor. It creates a feeling of mistrust between all races against whites, and whites, now knowing all other races mistrust and hate them, now are werry of all the others and mistrust them, which will be then used as further "proof" of racism of all whites and fuel the fire, its a self fulfilling prophecy and we cant fan that fire with the persistant use of the term white privildge. Its too damn dangerous and an inaccurate term, one of its largest faults is that its too effin broad.

Re: How has White Privildge affecred your life

Surely social scientists have measured WP. How white does one need to be to benefit? Does the extent to which it is given vary by skin color of the giver, the recipient, or is it based on a ratio of skin colors. Does the amount vary by skin color? or is there a threshold effect? The possibilities are endless

Re: How has White Privildge affecred your life

Originally Posted by David W Pratt

Surely social scientists have measured WP. How white does one need to be to benefit? Does the extent to which it is given vary by skin color of the giver, the recipient, or is it based on a ratio of skin colors. Does the amount vary by skin color? or is there a threshold effect? The possibilities are endless

Now there's an interesting thought or two. Our mob doesn't discriminate on the basis of colour. Never has, never will....

"Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome and charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime" Mark Twain... so... Carpe the living sh!t out of the Diem

Re: How has White Privildge affecred your life

Speaking of not discriminating on the basis of colour... just squint a bit and you'd never know that she and I have different skin colours. Can't even spot her Islam...

"Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome and charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime" Mark Twain... so... Carpe the living sh!t out of the Diem

Re: How has White Privildge affecred your life

Re: How has White Privildge affecred your life

Originally Posted by David W Pratt

Surely social scientists have measured WP. How white does one need to be to benefit? Does the extent to which it is given vary by skin color of the giver, the recipient, or is it based on a ratio of skin colors. Does the amount vary by skin color? or is there a threshold effect? The possibilities are endless.

I'll answer a silly bit of snark seriously. 'White' and 'black' in the US have historically been legally and culturally entirely binary, the old 'one drop of inferior blood' rule. Until pretty recently you were either white or not, but it was only partially connected to genetics. The irony, of course is that most African-Americans (descendants of slaves, not more recently arrived Africans) are actually mixed race, f***ing the female slaves being a standard privilege of ownership in the old days; it's immeditaly obvious next to recently-arrived west Africans. There were a whole bunch of odd terms for mixed-race folks; mulattoes, quadroons, octaroons - but they were never, ever white, culturally or legally. See the story of Thomas Jefferson's children by Martha Jefferson and Sally Hemings for a very interesting example.

Of course, those whose appearance was European enough could sometimes 'pass' - go somewhere their ancestry wasn't known and become white, vanishing into the white population. A fair number of Thomas Jefferson's and Sally Hemings' descendants did just that; Ms Hemings herself was genetically only half African and some of them had very light skin. But you had to be careful not to be found out, otherwise you'd be kicked out of the white race.

I'm sorry, guys, but the idea that the effects of hundreds of years of legal slavery, and another hundred years of grotesque bigotry and legal second-class citizenship for African-Americans is somehow just going to vanish in fifty years is way beyond ridiculous. Face it, for all of our lovey rhetoric about 'all men are created equal' we live in a country that to a great extent was built upon the oppression of folks from Africa and their descendants, and the ideas invented to justify it. That's the fundamental contradiction at the heart of the American experiment. It's been more evident in the south as slaves were a much larger part of the population there, but it's true everywhere. Things have improved a lot, but the effects persist. No, I don't like it either.

(I'm leaving out nonwhite folks from elsewhere just for simplicity; until quite recently the vast majority of non-whites in the US were African-American descendants of slaves.)

Last edited by Keith Wilson; 06-14-2018 at 07:52 AM.

"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations,
for nature cannot be fooled."